By Andrew Liszewski

Shown for the first time at Baselworld 2009, La Machine à Ecrire le Temps or ‘The Machine That Writes the Time’ is an automaton designed to relate to the 21st century. While Pierre Jaquet-Droz created his automata back in the late eighteenth century, La Machine à Ecrire le Temps was created by Montres Jaquet Droz, the company that bares his name today. It’s development and construction took almost a decade, and the final product contains over 1,200 components including 84 ball bearings, 50 cams, 9 belts and is protected by an aluminum and liquid crystal glass case allowing the inner workings to be obscured at the push of a button.

The company claims they can produce a “few copies per year” of the La Machine à Ecrire le Temps for the tidy sum of 400,000 Swiss francs, or just over $342,000. So I’d suggest checking out the video included after the jump, because that’s probably as close as most of us will ever get to seeing this thing in action.

[ Montres Jaquet Droz ] VIA [ MB&F & Born Rich ]

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By Evan Ackerman

Looky here, it’s yet another smallest flash drive ever! The EagleTec Nano flash drive measures a minuscule 19 x 15 x 6mm and weighs only 3 grams. It manages to stuff as much as 8 gigs of memory in there somewhere… To be fair, I can’t really see how a flash drive could get much smaller than this without being totally impractical and an accidental inhalation risk. But, I have faith that those issues aren’t going to prevent it from happening anyway.

The EagleTec Nano flash drives comes with 4 gigs for $22, or 8 gigs for $33.

[ Brando ] VIA [ Ubergizmo ]

This post is syndicated with permission from GamerFront.net

If you haven’t gotten around to playing one of the games in the recent Lego franchise (Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Batman) I really do advise it. Those games might be aimed at kids, but they’re still a blast to play. Later this year, we will have another addition to the series which, despite the rumors that were floating around a few weeks back, caught me a bit by surprise. I’m talking about Lego Rock Band.

That’s right, we had Lego games based on movies and comics, and now we have one based on another game. Crazy. There aren’t a lot of details out just yet, but we know that it will be “Family-Friendly” and you can “Build a Band and Rock the Universe.” The release date is a hazy “holiday 2009” with consoles being listed as Xbox 360, PS3, Wii and DS.

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By Chris Scott Barr

Light switch covers aren’t usually something that I find myself very interested in. They aren’t very exciting, and if you try to replace them with a novelty cover, they just look cheesy. Of course everything looks better when steampunked, so it didn’t come as too much of a surprise when I saw these DIY light switch plates.

These are cool not only because they are unique, but some of them even add functionality to the otherwise boring switch. A candle holder, bell and even a hook for your keys are pretty cool ideas. The best part is that they aren’t too hard to make. Just a brass plate, some gears, solder paste and a few tools are all you need. Of course you’ll actually need the time and patience to make one, since it’s not something you can actually buy in a store.

[ SteampunkWorkshop ] VIA [ CoolestGadgets ]

By Chris Scott Barr

If you haven’t seen the new Mac vs PC ads yet, I recommend checking them out. I use both Macs and PCs, so I try not to take sides in the fanboy battles, but I do enjoy the ads from Apple. Well one of the recent ads had a lot of legal mumbo-jumbo on the screen whenever PC would make a statement. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, go watch it and come back, this will make more sense. Anyway, have you wondered just what all of that tiny text said? Well wonder no longer, as a few people have squinted at their screens long enough to transcribe the whole thing. Read on for the dirty details.

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By Andrew Liszewski

I would have never considered riding a Vespa or any kind of scooter to be an ‘extreme’ activity, but apparently all you have to do is remove the seat and you’ll end up with something like the Standbike Board which appears to be an easy way to make the evening news. (In a bad way.) Powered by a 250 ccm Aprilia engine, the Standbike has a top speed of about 87 mph and it provides a unique riding experience since without a seat you need to use your whole body to brace and balance during acceleration, braking and cornering. Not surprisingly the Standbike isn’t street legal and is designed to be enjoyed on a closed track with plenty of safety gear, but there is a seat accessory that can be easily attached allowing it be used like a regular scooter on public roads.

At the moment the Standbike isn’t quite available to the public, but if you’re interested there’s a no obligation sign-up form on the company’s website and applications will eventually be filled based on the order in which they were received.

[ Standbike ] VIA [ Gizmag ]

By Chris Scott Barr

I don’t consider myself to be the tree hugging type, but I do try any recycle when I can. By that I of course mean when it takes no additional effort on my part. Hey, at least I’m honest. Anyway, you don’t usually find me out trying to persuade others to do their part for the environment. However, with the release of these Green Star Wars Tees, I might just start spreading the word.

Zazzle has a collection of Star Wars shirts that each have a simple message about being being more environmentally friendly. The shirts don’t look too cheesy, so your average Star Wars geek won’t think twice about wearing it outside. Not that we go outside that often. There are six designs that can be found on several different shirt styles for around $27 each.

[ Zazzle ] VIA [ GearFuse ]

By Shane McGlaun

I once managed to fling my notebook computer across the room where it landed flat on its back with a thud. I just knew when I opened it up the LCD would be shattered and it would never work again. The only thing broken was the hard drive and after replacing it I was back surfing the net again.

Samsung has a new hard drive that is ruggedized to prevent just the sort of damage my notebook received. The hard drive is called the Spinpoint M7 and can withstand shock up to 400G/2ms while operating. The 2.5-inch drive is available in 250, 320, 400, and 500GB capacities.

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By Shane McGlaun

I am a big fan of PC gaming and I really like computer hardware as well. I am not really that into overclocking though, I prefer to get my video cards overclocked from the factory so I don’t worry about frying what I just spent big money on.

If you are into overclocking things like your video cards, MSI has the perfect new product for you called the N260GTX Lightning and Lightning Black Edition. Both of the cards feature solid caps for durability and a world’s first 10 phase PWM.

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